Fact of the day

Information is the most powerful weapon.

Monday

Fact N°
2077

Animal biodiversity reduces the threat of disease in humans.

Aside from simply being desirable in and of itself, biodiversity helps insulate humans from animal-borne diseases. Since the rate of disease transmission depends on the number of available animals that can be infected, diverse populations slow the spread of disease compared to homogeneous ones (this concept has been proposed theoretically in the past, but was only experimentally confirmed in a 2009 study of Panamanian rats and hantavirus). This trend complements the concept of zooprophylaxis -- the idea that having livestock around for mosquitoes to feed on, for example, diverts those mosquitoes from seeking out humans instead, thereby slowing the spread of malaria.

Tuesday

Fact N°
2078

Doctors have performed the first all-robot surgical operation.

The McGill University Health Centre in Montreal was home to the first operation in which both the anesthetist ("McSleepy") and the surgeon ("DaVinci") were robots. DaVinci is operated from a nearby workstation, allowing the surgeon more delicate movements than human hands are capable of, while McSleepy can be configured to provide anesthesia based on the specific needs of individual surgeries. The two robots were both utilized in a prostatectomy in October 2010, their collaboration marking a world first.

Wednesday

Fact N°
2079

First impressions are generally accurate judgments of personality.

A University of Texas study showed participant-judges two sets of photos -- one in which subjects were posed in a carefully neutral way, and another candid set. The subjects answered a questionnaire about their own traits, and those traits -- like extroversion and self-esteem -- were readily apparent to the judges, just from looking at the subjects' photos. This may seem like an obvious conclusion from a set of candid photographs (given the opportunity to judge body language), but even the carefully posed photographs were still good indicators of personality for some traits.

Thursday

Fact N°
2080

A device called BrainPort allows users to see with their tongues.

The BrainPort device consists of a video camera mounted on a pair of sunglasses, a phone-sized handheld computer and an array of electrodes that sit on the user's tongue. The CPU relays the camera's visual information, sending out stronger or weaker electrical pulses depending on the lightness or darkness of each individual pixel, effectively rendering a black-and-white image in a tactile way. For the user, it's then just a matter of learning how to "see" by interpreting these signals. Though acclimating to the device is a learning process, its capabilities are impressive; some patients using it are even able to make out distinct letters and numbers.

Friday

Fact N°
2081

90% of life on Earth died out 250 million years ago.

The event scientists have dubbed "The Great Dying" marked the end of the Paleozoic era. Throughout this era, the continents were combining in the supercontinent Pangaea, and pre-dinosaur and pre-mammalian reptiles roamed the Earth. Suddenly, though, nearly all of the planet's marine species (around 95%) died out, likely due to environmental factors, which also coincided with the only known mass extinction of insects. Several theories have been proposed as catalysts (an impact event, volcanic eruptions), but regardless, the end result was the largest extinction event on record.

Saturday

Fact N°
2082

The Berlin Wall was built in one night.

The Soviet Union and the other countries who occupied Germany following World War II (the U.S., Britain and France) originally passed through one another's sections of Berlin freely, but this all changed in 1961. So many East Germans were fleeing to West Germany -- around 15% of the population -- that Khrushchev and East Germany mandated the closing of the borders and the construction of the wall. The 100-mile-long Berlin Wall went up overnight, its construction starting after midnight on August 13, 1961, and it remained standing until 1989.

Sunday

Fact N°
2083

The term "liberal arts" actually refers to a specific set of disciplines.

Though the major is now often taken to mean a generalized course of study in the humanities, the term "liberal arts" has a long history of literal meanings. In the early Middle Ages, the seven arts -- derived the from "seven pillars" alluded to in Proverbs -- were logic, rhetoric, arithmetic, geometry, music, astronomy, and grammar. The artes liberales were denoted as distinct from the artes illiberales, which were more akin to specific vocational training.